Institute of Physics announces 2014 award winners

Professor Jin from the National Institute of Standards and Technology in the US – whose experimental work in laser cooling atoms has led to the practical realisation of universal laws that underpin fundamental quantum behaviour – receives the Isaac Newton Medal, the IOP’s highest accolade.

Professor Ed Hinds from Imperial College London, a compatriot of Professor Jin’s in the field of cold matter, said, “Professor Jin is an outstanding, clever, creative scientist.

“Her incredibly complex experiments have significantly advanced our understanding of the behaviour of electrons in materials. Through her laser cooling of atoms, she has shown that half-integer spin fermions can be coupled to behave like full integer spin bosons.

“These fermion condensates and the work that she has undertaken on extremely cold polar molecules have helped us go deep into the quantum world; a world that we’re only just starting to understand in complex many-body systems.

“Her work is likely to lead to profound advances in measuring and sensing, as well as quantum computing.”

As the citation reads, “Ultra-cold Fermi gases now represent one of the major activities in all of atomic physics, an activity where Jin remains the leader and pioneer.”

Alongside the Isaac Newton Medal, IOP also announces its Gold medals and its awards for distinguished research in a selection of subjects, for outstanding contributions at an early stage in a physicist’s career and for achievement in physics education and outreach.

This year’s Gold medal winners are Professor Tim Palmer from the University of Oxford for the development of probabilistic weather and climate systems, Professor Giles Davies and Professor Edmund Linfield from the University of Leeds for their work on terahertz physics and technology, Professor Gerhard Materlik from University College London for his leadership at the Diamond Light Source, and Professor Michael Payne from University of Cambridge for the development of computational techniques that have revolutionised materials design.

The seven additional Subject medals reflect the vibrancy of the research being undertaken by UK physicists, with accolades for work in a range of exciting areas, from Professor David Marshall’s contribution to the fluid dynamics of our world’s oceans and Professor Benjamin Simon’s insights into the mechanisms that regulate stem cell behaviour to the University of Oxford’s Professor Anthony Bell’s elucidation of the origin and impact of cosmic rays.